George Lyon on behalf of the Scottish Liberal Democrats is against proposed changes where manufacturers of farm quads would have to build them to road specifications. He has been campaigning and declared that the changes would drastically reduce the effectiveness of quad bikes on the farm. One of the changes proposed is to have a speed limit of 40kph for all ATVs.
At the moment, proposals are being considered by parliament and EU Ministers. Lyon has written to MP Mike Penning, who is the UK Minister of Transport, asking him to consider backing the campaign which is against the speed cuts. Currently, the top speed is 60 km per hour.
Mr Lyon has more than 35 years of experience in farming and riding a farm quad, and so knows that the proposed changes would reduce the effectiveness of ATVs around the farm. One example quoted by My Lyon was in the case of rounding up stock and taking them back to the farm after grazing. Lyon said that the speed limit would affect this as a limit of 40km an hour would make it impossible to catch any animal that broke away as it would be able to outrun the quad bike.
He also went on to say that farmers typically have to cover long distances on their quad bikes just to carry out daily work around the farm, such as delivering feed to animals over large areas. Again the changes in speed would hamper this and the hours worked would increase. My Lyon is asking for a balance between safety on quads and effectiveness of them around the farm and believes that the current speed limit gives just that.